Playoffs aren't the only interesting games in town

by Don Seeley, Pottstown Mercury Sports Editor

Posted on November 7, 2008

The second season, better known as the playoffs, kicks off tonight throughout the area, District 1 and around the state.

But Saturday afternoon's local three-game card is as good as it gets for teams not sharing the postseason spotlight, for fans looking for a few sub-plots and history ... or for one last glimpse of two outstanding individual talents who have made quite an impact on area football fields and in The Mercury's record book during their high school careers.

For starters, there is the Pioneer Athletic Conference finale for Perkiomen Valley and Methacton down in Fairview Village, while Perkiomen School entertains Pennington (N.J.) to close out its 107th football season. And then there's the biggie with Lawrenceville visiting The Hill School in one of the most entertaining and intense — not to mention longest — prep school rivalries in the entire nation.

Down at Methacton, the Vikings and Warriors renew their series that, despite being considerably lopsided as far as the wins and losses go, was once a fiery Thanksgiving Day feature. They haven't lined up against one another since 1993, when most of the current players were either rolling around in diapers or just out of them while stumbling around the living room looking for the nearest chair, table or sofa to support their next step.

The Vikings, who shared the PAC-10 championship a year ago but were hurt by graduation and then injury after injury midway through the season, are looking for the positive – a win – to exit 2008. They've lost three in a row, and four of their last five losses have been by a touchdown or less.

The game will also be the last for quarterback Zach Zulli – the MVP of the PAC-10 as well as The Mercury's Player of the Year last season. Arguably one of the purest passers in the league's 23-year history, Zulli has practically rewritten its record book and the area's record book ... and been an absolute class act in doing so.

Methacton, meanwhile, is all even on the ledger — 4-4 in the PAC-10 and 5-5 overall — and would like nothing more than to close out its first run through the league with a winning record. An overall winning slate would be the program's first since the turn of the century – since 2000, that is. That would be a tribute to devoted head coach Bob McNally. And stopping Zulli and the Vikings would be quite the final compliment for senior Tim Smith, whose knack for finding the ball, picking it off and returning it long distances has elevated him to one of the league's and area's best defensive backs.

Speaking of that knack for finding the ball ... it's hard to find anyone around this neighborhood who is better at putting his hands on it and then knowing what to do with it than Perkiomen's Abdul Smith. With all due respect to the rest of the Indians, no one has carried his team(s) more than Smith has. Already committed to Rutgers, Smith talent is reflected in his eye-popping statistics, but his leadership – regardless of where he's lined up on both sides of the line of scrimmage – has bee immeasurable.

Smith's goal against Pennington will be to help get the Indians one more win and finish with a winning record for the third straight season – quite an achievement for a program that once suffered through 30-plus straight losses and even went dormant for seven years (1992-1998).

If history, or that no-love-for-one-another feeling (on the field, that is) is a preference, there's none better than the Lawrenceville-Hill game. The two schools meet Saturday for the 105th consecutive year and 112th time overall, making it one of America's longest running scholastic football series. The atmosphere surrounding Hill's layout just off King Street is, well, exhilarating.

STATE NOTES

OUTTA HERE: Altoona athletic director Vince Nedimyer confirmed earlier this week that the school is "considering" not playing next year's Mid-Penn Conference Commonwealth Division game with Harrisburg.

"We just thought it would be in the best interest of our student-athletes' safety and well-being to evaluate our relationship with Harrisburg," Nedimyer told the Patriots-News in Harrisburg.

Altoona has also withdrawn from next month's prestigious tip-off tournament at Harrisburg High School for what Neidmyer expressed as safety and security concerns stemming from last Saturday's football game in the state capitol – a game the Mountain Lions lost, 55-7.

Although there were no fights during the game, there were several personal foul penalties called and two players – one from each team – were ejected.

POINT WELL TAKEN: William Penn (York) is the first PIAA-member team to score over 500 points this season. The Bearcats pushed their total to 502 last weekend despite losing its first game, 40-21, to crosstown rival Central York, and are the only team averaging 50-plus points a game in the state. Exactly 20 other teams are putting up 40-plus points a game going into the weekend, the last being Central York (40.3).

SHOOTING BLANKS: Shadyside Academy put up its seventh shutout of the season in last weekend's District 7-Class AA playoffs – a 42-0 rout of Bishop Canevin. The unbeaten Indians (10-0), who haven't permitted a point to be scored on them in the last three games, have allowed just 34 the entire season. But they're still ranked No. 2 behind District 7-Class A's unbeaten Clairton (10-0), which despite only four shutouts has yielded a mere 3.0 points a game while outscoring its opponents by a 451-30 spread.

HE'S BACK: Riverside's Joe Klebon missed six weeks with a fractured bone in his foot. So what did he do in his return last week ... he returned the game's opening kickoff 95 yards for a touchdown to help the unbeaten Vikings to a 28-0 lead at the break and eventual 34-20 win over previously unbeaten Dunmore up in District 2.

MEETING OF MINDS: Girard's Mina George and Wilmington's Terry Verrelli – both with more than 200 career wins (452 combined to be exact) – will match wits in a District 10-Class AA playoff game at Slippery Rock University.

STEPPING AWAY: Two of Pennsylvania's most respected coaches announced their retirements this past week.

Ambridge's ageless Don Yannessa put in 37 years at three different schools and was 249-137-7. Yannessa had a small part – three lines, to be exact – playing the role of a coach in the movie "All The Right Moves," which starred Tom Cruise.

Also stepping down was Moon Area's Mark Capuano spent his entire 24-year career with the Tigers and leaves with a school-record 143 wins.

NATIONAL NOTES

CATCH THIS: Out in Washington, Prosser senior Kirby Moore broke the national high school record for career touchdown receptions last weekend when he caught his 84th and 85th. Moore, who caught the bulk of them from his older brother when he was a freshman and sophomore, will team up with older brother Kellen Moore next year at Boise State, where he's the starting quarterback.

RUNNING AWAY: In Illinois, Huntley High School ballcarriers ran a combined 53 times for 702 yards in a 70-63 win over Batavia to break the 66-year-old state record for yards rushing in a game. The Red Raiders ran by the mark of 699 yards, set by Belleville West way back in 1942. Huntley and Batavia combined for 1,358 yards of offense in the game.

FAMILY TIES: Dylan Favre, a junior quarterback for Bay St. Louis (Miss.) and nephew of New York Jets' quarterback and future Hall of Famer Brett Favre, set a state record for touchdown passes in a season. Favre threw five last week to boost his total to 43 on the year. He now has 79 in his career and is in reach of that state mark (104) when he returns to the field next season.

HOOKING UP: Also in Mississippi, unbeaten Taylorsville had an easy time with Clarke, 62-39, as quarterback Dominique Sullivan hit on 17 of 21 passes for 366 yards and seven touchdowns – five of them going to Billy Hamilton.

PICK MAN: Xavier Daniels intercepted five passes last week to help Giddings smoke Smithville, 35-7, in the teams' renewal of their longtime Texas rivalry.

DEAN OF DELAWARE: Newark's Butch Simpson became Delaware's first football coach to hit the 250 career win mark last week following a 22-6 victory against Christiana. Simpson, on the sidelines for 32 seasons, is 250-88-7.

A LOSS AT LAST: Up in Stephen, Minn., where they play nine-man football, Stephen-Argyle High saw its state-record, 76-game winning streak end following a 7-0 playoff loss to Kittson Central. ... Mississippi's nationally-ranked South Panola owns the nation's longest active winning streak – 85 straight going into this weekend's game.

SHOWTIME: The nation's high school Game of the Week will be in Ohio, where nationally-ranked St. Ignatius (10-1) looks to avenge its lone loss of the season to Glenville (11-0). Both teams are ranked among the Top 20 in three national polls.

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